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Weaver Wire, Chapter 18: Too many cooks. I mean strikes. Wait. Too many strikes?
By Levi Weaver Aug 6, 2019 32
Topic of the Week: 100mph Emmanuel Clase and the curious case of “too many strikes”
One of the moves Texas made was to call up Emmanuel Clase (pronounced Clahs-ay). Clase ended his 2018 campaign with the Spokane Indians after coming to Texas in a deal for backup catcher Brett Nicholas and almost immediately upon arrival in the Rangers organization saw an uptick in his fastball, from 93-95 to triple-digits. This year, he began the season with the High-A Down East Wood Ducks and, after a brief bump in the road upon arrival at AA Frisco, had been mowing down minor-league hitters. He made his big-league debut in what was at the time a one-run game, entering in the fifth inning of the Rangers’ 9-4 win over Detroit on Sunday.
For a quick brush-up on Clase, you can read Saad Yousuf’s May article here, but the big question for many Rangers fans was — no offense to Brett Nicholas — why the heck did the Padres make that trade? Did they not expect him to be this good?
“Of course, that’s why we traded him,” joked Padres GM A.J. Preller. “No, it’s a good story for the organization in the fact that Chris Kemp, Felix Feliz, Trevor Schumm and those guys identified somebody that obviously has moved to the big leagues quickly … Obviously, if we felt like Clase was going to take that type of jump, we never would have included him as one of the players they could have selected in that trade.”
But it’s one thing to point at such a spike in production and marvel that it did happen. It’s another altogether to try to identify how. Clase credits Padres Dominican Summer League pitching coach Jackson Quezada. When the team moved Clase from a starting role into the bullpen, Quezada suggested that Clase come set in the stretch with his hands higher up, near his shoulder. Previously, Clase had set his hands near his back hip.
If that doesn’t seem like a satisfactory answer, you’re not alone, but that’s the answer Clase gave, speaking through an interpreter on Monday.
Additionally, Quezada helped Clase with his command using an unorthodox technique.
“In the Dominican, (Quezada) would test me,” Clase said. “He would put two little dolls on either side of the plate with a little margin in the middle, and he told me ‘throw me five pitches in there’. So that’s how I started to gain my control.”
The trick worked. After walking about half as many hitters as he struck out in 2016 and 2017, Clase’s 2018 season saw a drastic change. Not only was he throwing much harder, but he was walking fewer hitters: just six in 2018, compared to 27 strikeouts. That trend continued in 2019: one walk vs. 11 strikeouts in seven innings in Down East and eight walks vs. 39 strikeouts in 37⅔ innings in Frisco.
“He can put it where he wants to,” said Chris Woodward on Monday. “That was the first question I had: ‘Can he throw strikes?’ The biggest thing for me is if you can throw strikes we can work that. You may get hit; I’m okay with that … if he can throw it over the plate, we can work with that — maybe we can figure out where on the plate, but — they said he goes too many strikes. I had never heard that. ‘Too many strikes?’
(But) if he throws it over the plate too much, he needs to learn the put-away pitch — in to a lefty, up on his hands, the wipeout slider; he’ll throw a slider for strike. So you need to learn when to bury it, throw it down below the zone. And he started doing that, and he started having a lot of success, obviously. But to have a kid that throws 101 miles an hour, and they say he throws too many strikes? That’s a good problem to have.”
"I've suffered a great many tragedies in my life....most of them never happened". Mark Twain